CHATHAM, Ont. — Contrary to some claims, Navistar’s heavy truck assembly plant in Chatham, Ont. can easily ramp up to build Canadian military vehicles, says the CAW’s assistant to the president Robert Chernecki.

In a letter to the editor at the Chatham Daily News, Chernecki disputes comments made by Navistar spokesperson Roy Wiley (Chernecki spells it Wylie throughout the letter) that the plant was built to only assemble on-highway tractors, not the class 5 military truck the Canadian government recently hired Navistar to build in Texas.

The CAW is furious the contract went stateside at the same time Navistar and other truckmakers are laying off hundreds of plant workers in Canada. Citing plummeting commercial truck demand in the face of recession, Navistar has cut about 800 jobs from the Chatham plant since last September.

Last month, Wiley disagreed with the CAW’s assertion that the plant could take on the military contract instead, with "very little or no adjustment." He said that those trucks wouldn’t fit on the assembly line that was designed for class 8 highway tractors.

In response, Chernecki says "(Wiley) has absolutely no understanding of the plant and its current capabilities." He explains how significant changes at the plant (made possible with a federal cash infusion in 2003) improved the flexibility of this facility.

"I can tell you the local management nor our engineers, our skilled trades or our production people agree with (Wiley)," he writes in the letter, which is addressed to Conservative Chatham-Kent MP Dave Van Kesteren. "I would challenge you and him to come into the plant and show us why we could not produce these trucks."

Chernecki says Navistar’s current supplier base, along with new technology in the robotics, the paint shop, and the hoist system at the plant are fully capable of handling the military trucks. "There is no change to the assembly line at all. It is a simple matter of adjusting the dollies to accept the frame in the military truck and this can be done using our existing frames."

He adds: "it boggles the mind that in the middle of a manufacturing crisis in this province and country, the federal government still does not understand the importance of buying Canadian, even if it costs a little more."

Ironically, some U.S. manufacturers, unions, and protectionist politicians are thinking the exact same thing these days about products destined for the American market but made in Canada — Ontario-made automobiles included.